Women, peace, and security in the work of the UN Security Council
In 2000, the UN Security Council adopted resolution 1325 (2000), linking gender equality to the maintenance of international peace and security. Almost two decades and nine additional resolutions later, women, peace, and security has become one of the main thematic pillars of the Security Council’s work. While the protection and empowerment of women in conflict-affected countries is a global agenda that predates resolution 1325 and extends beyond the workings of the Security Council, it is in this body where women, peace, and security got its name, its normative framework, and its main stage.
Civil society partners track key developments on women, peace, and security in the Council, provide monthly advocacy messages tailored to its programme of work, and monitor its debates and its outcomes.
Our solutions
UN Women:
- leads the preparation of the Secretary-General’s annual report on women and peace and security, presented every year to the Council in October;
- facilitates the participation of women from civil society in thematic and country-specific meetings of the Security Council;
- supports Council members in integrating women, peace, and security issues in each month’s programme of work and the Council’s deliberations, visits, resolutions, and presidential statements;
- briefs the Council when requested by the rotating president; and
- acts as the secretariat for the Security Council’s Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security.
Security Council Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security
The Security Council Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security (IEG) was called for in Security Council resolution 2242 (2015), and since 2016 provides a space for regular consultations between Council experts and the United Nations on urgent concerns regarding women, peace, and security in country-specific situations. It aims at improving the flow of information and analysis to the Council on situations on its agenda, and sharpening the focus and specificity of Council deliberations, oversight, and actions, including by its subsidiary bodies.
Since 2016, the IEG has held meetings on the situations in Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Iraq, the Lake Chad Basin, Lebanon, Libya, Mali and the broader Sahel region, Myanmar, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen, as well as thematic meetings with women protection advisers in peace operations on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Download the background notes and summaries for each of these meetings (ZIP archive, 22MB).
For more information about the purpose, structure, and format of the IEG, please refer to the official “Guidelines for the Informal Expert Group on Women and Peace and Security”.